But any other team winning in any other fashion than the way St. Thomas Aquinas did on Monday wouldn't have been as much fun.

St. Thomas put the drama in overdrive on Monday afternoon, scoring four runs in the bottom of the seventh inning to cap a 5-4 win over Portsmouth, handing the Clippers their first loss in 89 games, a streak that dates back to the beginning of the 2008 season.

"The way we won is what really impresses me about our kids," St. Thomas coach Marc Schoff said. "That team (Portsmouth) set the standard. I don't know if people can really even begin to understand what winning 89 games in a row is like. They haven't lost a baseball game in about 1,800 days, if my math is correct."

Turns out Schoff was off by exactly one week. It was 1,793 days earlier (June 3, 2007) the last time the Clippers lost, a 4-3 defeat to Hollis-Brookline in the quarterfinals of the Class I tournament. Portsmouth followed that loss with four consecutive unbeaten, state-championship seasons. Ten of their 89 wins came against St. Thomas, including state-title games in 2009 and last year.

A big hit for the Saints in the seventh inning came from Jordan Bean, who hit a two-run double with one out to tie the game at 4-4. Three batters later, Chris White hit a ground ball up the middle to score Bean and give St. Thomas the win.

"It's been such a great rivalry," Portsmouth coach Tim Hopley said. "So many of our games have just been battles. For Jordan, a Portsmouth kid, he just battles and battles and battles. I have probably more respect for him as a player than any opponent in my time here. I know the amount of work he puts in. We appreciate things like that as a team because that's what we strive for."

The game featured a number of players on both sides who competed for the Portsmouth Little League All-Star team that went to the World Series in 2006. St. Thomas's Bean and Steve Hemming were among those on that team, as well as Portsmouth's Billy Hartmann, Matt Feeney, Andrew Haslam and Connor McCauley.

"If we're going to lose to someone, I'd rather lose to them," McCauley said about Monday's thriller. "After that many attempts, it was bound to happen. Us and them have been the best two teams in the division. They're our best competition."

After the game, both teams were oozing with respect for one another. There is a regular-season rematch scheduled for May 21 in Portsmouth, and the odds are good the two teams will meet again in the playoffs this year.

"The respect I have for them is incredible and what they've done over there," Bean said. "All the players that I played with and the ones that I haven't. They're still the state champions and it's still a regular season game. But to get this win was a great confidence booster and a great team win."

One of the keys to the streak has been Hopley's level-headed approach to coaching — never letting his team get too high on its success or too down on itself when things weren't going right. He said the team will continue to take that approach as it continues its season, which has yet to reach the halfway point.

"This doesn't change anything," Hopley said. "We're not going to let this moment define what we've accomplished or let it take away from the focus we have. Obviously, we have work to do. But we'll go to work tomorrow. Win or lose today, it would have been the same thing. We're going to try to get ourselves better, and focus on our next game."

With more than half the season remaining, Schoff was quick to put the win in perspective. St. Thomas improved to 7-0 while Portsmouth fell to 6-1.

"I told the kids we can't win a state championship today," Schoff said. "But we couldn't lose one either. That mindset helped us."

Ricky Holt and Bean were the starting pitchers for each team, and both pitched well. Holt left the game in the seventh with the score tied 4-4, but was tagged with the loss as he was responsible for the winning run.

"I've played against Jordan my whole life and I finally got to pitch against him," Holt said. "We both ran out of gas a little bit. The streak's done now. Now that we've finally lost, hopefully we don't lose again this year."

Bean was tagged for a pair of hits to lead off the sixth inning and both scored as the Clippers extended their one-run lead to 4-1.

"The more times you go around their lineup, the more difficult it is to get guys out," Bean said. "I was making adjustments, and they were, too. They were making them a little quicker than I was. They have a great lineup to get through. You have to make adjustments with them and I just didn't make them quick enough."

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